


Found You in the In-Between

by Kittycattycat



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, It's gonna get tons fluffier after a while. Promise, M/M, Undertale Saves and Resets, also THEY ARENT RELATED - Freeform, gaster also remembers resets, gaster is alive and also a huge nerd, i don't know how to tag this honestly, sans and w.d. try to learn each other's languages with limited success, sans is better off than gaster tho, sorta - Freeform, yall better not play me like that I swear
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-11
Updated: 2018-11-11
Packaged: 2019-08-22 08:25:58
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,389
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16594358
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kittycattycat/pseuds/Kittycattycat
Summary: So. Gaster. Wingdin Gaster. An odd name to be sure, but who’s Sans to judge? Plus, he kinda likes it. It has a nice ring to it, and in a semi-metaphorical way, saying it leaves a pleasant taste in his mouth.





	Found You in the In-Between

Working side-by-side with Asgore’s royal scientist wasn't really what Sans expected himself to be doing that day, but hey, it beat standin’ around and shovelin’ snow, that’s for sure. It was less like work and more like cleaning house. The guy is clearly smart as all hell, but all the papers and books scattered around really gave the impression that he was just sorta a messy disaster? Sans could relate, really, he could. He did wish though that he could’ve at least told what all those random documents said— they looked to be in some sort of obscure rune-based language, the same one he (correctly) assumed W.D. spoke in. It's not any tongue he'd ever heard before, or heard OF before, but oh well. He picked up another document and gave one last crack at deciphering the thing.

The man (or skeleton, he guesses) himself had looked over and down at Sans, smiling gently, and brightly says something that Sans is fairly certain is a polite question based on the man’s tone of speaking alone.

Were he equipped with a body that possessed them, Sans’ eyebrows would certainly have drawn together then. His grin became slightly more nervous and awkward than it had been previously, “Uh, sorry pal, I’ve told ya, I have no clue what you just said to me. Whatever your language is, I’m afraid I don't speak it.”

The smile at the corner of W.D.’s mouth twitched downwards then, less in disapproval and more in vague disappointment, Sans thinks (hopes?), and he didn't say anything in response. The guy just nodded like he understood what Sans said (he almost certainly didn't) and wandered over to another corner of the room to lift up a large cardboard box filled with manila folders absolutely stuffed to the brim with even more papers. Sans wished he would've asked Asgore why the place needed cleaning. He means, it obviously DID, but he wonders why he decided that day specifically was the day to do it. Maybe it was just one of those ‘I finally got the energy and the motivation to do this thing and if I don't do it now I know I never will’ type things? Who knows, certainly not him. His attempt to read the paper in front of him was clearly in vain, so he looked up from his spot on the floor and placed it on the table where he was pretty sure there was a stack a few minutes ago.

The cleaning had been a couple months back, maybe half a year, or maybe even almost a whole year— he’d stopped keeping track when the resets started happening more frequently— and he was still hangin’ out with the guy, enough to make Papyrus ask where he was going every day because ‘you never get outside like this!’ 

So. Gaster. Wingdin Gaster. An odd name to be sure, but who’s Sans to judge? Plus, he kinda likes it. It has a nice ring to it, and in a semi-metaphorical way, saying it leaves a pleasant taste in his mouth.

Once they'd mostly gotten past the language barrier, with Sans speaking almost fluently in Wingdings (finally, a name for the damn thing!) and Gaster speaking in choppy-but-fluent-enough-to-be-understandable Common, they became fast friends pretty easily. They talked a lot of science, mostly physics and the like, sometimes they'd even work on projects together, whirling around each other in the lab like they'd done it all their lives. But they also talked about other things, too. They could talk about anything, or nothing, for hours. Friends, family (just Sans talking to that end— Gaster didn't have anyone like that), what they were doing later (never much, but they always asked), what video games they liked and their favorite foods and “hey, you wouldn't wanna go grab a bite at Grillby’s, would ya? It'll be quick, promise!”

But right now W.D. and Sans are just in the lab, worn out from respective days of intense royal-sciencing and babysitting a younger brother to make sure he doesn't get himself into trouble. 

“Oh, I love this song!” Gaster grins, twirling his black pen between his fingerbones. It makes a gentle clacking sound as it flips over and over. 

“Wait,” Sans freezes, and Gaster looks over, slight startled, “W.D.… you’re seriously into 80’s pop?”

“Yes, definitely!”

Sans chuckles, glancing up at W.D.’s happy expression, “Oh, that’s cute.”

Gaster seems almost surprised, and a vaguely pinkish glow falls over his cheekbones, “Huh?”

“Nothing!”

There's a small moment of silence. A giggle pops out of his friend’s mouth, turning into a chortle, and then slowly morphing into full on laughter. Sans is laughing now, too, and even though he's not entirely sure why it's funny, he finds that it doesn't really matter because the laugh is more than definitely real and they just keep going. The laughter is echoing in the room and were the place not soundproof, he's pretty sure the whole Underground could hear them.

The song kept playing, and while Sans was busy trying to memorize the lyrics so he could sing it back badly if it ever came on again while they were together, Gaster sighed. It was heavy and deep and exhausted. Sans tilted his head over, and he had his head between his hands.

“All that laughter wear you out? That's okay, I get it.”

Silence.

“…You good, W.D.? I'll get you some water or food or somethin’— I know sometimes you forget to eat, and that ain't good bud, lemme tell ya.”

“[OH, WHEN WILL IT ALL RESET, SANS…?]”

His voice catches in his throat, and it threatens to choke him, “What…?”

“When—” Gaster starts, and clears his throat mid-syllable. Sans resists the urge to lighten the mood and re-offer that glass of water. “When will all it be undone…? Does this matter?”

Sans’ mind reels hard, and before he can even open his mouth, Gaster continues, “I'm sorry, I should not… I keep thinking it, I've been wanting to say it, for so long. You probably don't know what I'm talking of. It is just that,” the scientist rubs the heel of his palms against his eye sockets, like it will smudge away the thoughts whirling through his head, “with everyone else, it all. Repeats. The same conversations, the same jokes…”

He looks up at Sans, and for the first time it registers to the shorter one how utterly tired and worn his companion looks. “You've never told me the same joke twice, Sans. Did you know? …I must sound insane, but it doesn't even matter because when reset hits it will be all gone. You'll forget.”

“I don't forget,” Sans manages to finally choke out, “I thought you did.”

Gaster looks like he could cry, and blurts something to him suddenly and with more volume than Sans had ever heard from the man, “[DO NOT MOCK ME, I AM BEGGING YOU!]”

If Gaster looks like he could cry, Sans certainly IS. “I'm NOT!” he sobs, “I'm not, I promise!”

It hadn't even occurred to Sans, really, how absolutely exhausted he was with all of this timeline reset crap— the same days, the same people, the same conversations, the same reactions and the same jokes and the same laughs over and over and over. Watching that goddamn FLOWER kill his friends, his brother, over and over. Not being able to do anything. Sitting there and just watching as Undyne, Papyrus, and he played truth or dare, not even being surprised as they suddenly vanished from existence and Sans found himself standing watch at his sentry station, the cold creeping into his bones. 

He doesn't know how much of that he babbled aloud to his friend, and he also doesn't know when he buried his face against Gaster’s chest, but he can't say the latter is a decision he regrets. A tense hand is rubbing circles again this back and a voice is making soft shushing sounds above him that are hardly audible over occasional hiccups that Sans knows don't belong to him. Gaster says something gentle to him in Wingdings. Sans can't reign enough effort in to make the translation in his mind, but he finds that W.D.’s gesture easily crosses the boundary his words cannot.


End file.
